With about two months before the start of Formula SimRacing’s 2010 season, here is the announcement you’ve been waiting for.

FSR is starting off into the next decade with a new structure of series. The league will make a change on the concept it has been using since its existance in order to accommodate to the SimRacing standard of today, and to get ready for SimRacing’s future.

The league is going to step away from the old “World Series” system including the sub-categories of “Ace”, “Pro”, “Adv” and “Ama”. Instead, a new system will be introduced, which will reduce the amount of championships from four to two, whilst still keeping four races in the weekend.

In 2010, Formula SimRacing’s categories of racing will be called “AutoGP FSR World Championship”, “World Series” and “World Trophy”.
Changes concerning FSR’s highest category of racing, the WC, will be announced in a later statement. For now, we shall focus on the two brand new series.

The FSR World Series

The World Series will somewhat provide a twin to the AutoGP World Championship. No driving aids will be allowed, the race distance will be 100%, and the time of the event is going to be Saturday evening (GMT) at prime time, just like the WC a day later.

The series is going to be split into two races – two grids, allowing the top 52 Sim Racers of the category to get to the event.

Before the first season race in Bahrain, a Pre-Qualifying session amongst all the World Series applicants will be held in order to determine the top 26 who will be in G1, and positions 27-52 to start that first event in G2.

After the first race and after each of the remaining races, a so called relegation and promotion system will come into place, where the last four drivers of G1 move to G2 for the next event, whereas the top four drivers of G2 will move up to G1.

Drivers in both grids score points per race, which are going to be merged together into one championship – the “World Series Driver Championship” and the “World Series Team Championship”.
In order to keep competition within the front runners fair and predictable, the top ten drivers of the championship are protected from relegation for their next race.

The G1 race of each round will be Live Broadcasted, and the most successful drivers and teams are looking forward to an estimated amount of Prize Money between 2000 and 3000 Euros as well as FSR Trophies. The exact amount of prize money will depend on the sign-ups for the series, but will be announced before the start of the season.

The base entry fees for that category will be 65€ per driver and 10€ per team. Each team may run with two drivers.
FSR is going to offer a special discount of 20% on these fees until the end of January, making it 52€ for a driver license, and 8€ for a team license.

The FSR World Trophy

The World Trophy division is going to be similar to the World Series. It will be run with the same two-grid-system including relegation and promotion.
The Race Distance is going to be 75% and the event time will be Sunday afternoon (GMT). Driving aids for this series will be allowed, but each driving aid used will put a weight penalty on the car.

Grid 1 of the series will be Live Broadcasted at each round!
The winners of the series can look forward to free 2011 FSR World Series licenses as well as to FSR Trophies as reward for their efforts.
The pricing for the series will be 29€ for a driver license, and 5€ for a team license.

In Summary…

“Formula SimRacing, in the middle of the cold winter, has just done its spring-clean in order to be prepared for hot summer” states Dennis Hirrle, President of the International SimRacing Club.

“A few years ago, FSR had a very unique position on the market. The Club’s and League’s concepts were unique, almost revolutionary. FSR got rewarded with a lot of success, outstanding competition among the very best simracers of the world”, continues the German.
“Over the years, however, simracing has evolved further. It has evolved in a great way. Unfortunately, FSR hasn’t quite matched that process and has therefore suffered in recent times”.

“I am a long time member of FSR. Since 2004, FSR has been a part of my life. I’ve lived through probably all scenarios one could think of, I have seen the positives and negatives in this place. Being elected ISR Club President, it is my sheer responsibility to try and put FSR back to the level it belongs at. Looking at how SimRacing is currently changing, I’m convinced that if we don’t take some of these steps, in very soon time, FSR is going to have issues.
We need an overall reduction of championships, because we need a highly improved level of competition. Competition is what FSR is all about, it’s FSR’s strongest asset. We have to make use of it."

"Formula SimRacing shall be a top league for the serious Sim Racer – and a Sim Racer doesn’t use driving aids. We’ll still allow them in our lowest category, but with hefty weight penalties. Not to make people unhappy, but to help push them with evolving themselves. In order to maintain being a top product and evolve further, we must improve the quality of all our processes, so we have more expenses, therefore we need the new pricing model. In return, in 2010 we will offer the most Prizes in FSR’s history, and a unique FSR 2010 Mod for rFactor, making the league the perfect place for the top level racer” Hirrle comments on 2010 changes.

“The list goes on and on. But my vision is clear. In 2010, we will need to start turn FSR back to the right direction again. Before we can think about the future, we first need to compensate the loss of appeal in these previous years. And now, partnering with a real world race series (AutoGP), is the right time to get started” closes Hirrle.

Sign-Ups for the World Series and World Trophy will be opened on January 20th 2010.